Netanyahu: Israel Will Build New Housing

JERUSALEM - While the United States continued to criticize Israel over an east Jerusalem housing project approved during US Vice President Joe Biden's visit to Israel least week, Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu on Monday said construction in the capital would continue as usual.

"Construction in Jerusalem will continue in any part of the city as it has during the last 42 years," Netanyahu stressed at the Likud faction meeting. The prime minister added that Israel was committed to the 10-month building moratorium in the West Bank.

In the US, however, Israel's Ambassador to Washington Michael Oren said the crisis over the approval of 1,600 new housing units in the Ramat Shlomo neighborhood was "the worst since 1975."

Earlier Monday, at the Labor faction meeting, Defense Minister Ehud Barak also referred to the crisis with Washington, saying that "the government must work so the crisis will be forgotten and the talks get back on track," and explaining how he was working to decrease the tensions.

"I just had a meeting at the Knesset with Fred Hoff, aide to [US special Mideast envoy George] Mitchell, an American diplomat who has been working with us for many years, as well as with US Ambassador to Israel James Cunningham."

Barak told the faction that, "we discussed the necessary steps and possible ways to abate the recent tensions and resume the negotiations with the Palestinians."

The negotiations, Barak said, are "supremely needed and are an issue that Labor believes in. It's one of the reasons we are in the government."